Stop Spam Email

You need to only accept mail from your contacts in your options, but that isn’t foolproof. Here are some tips on trying to minimize spam.

You shouldn’t open unsolicted email from unknown sources. Often what happens is that when you open up spam, it sends back a trigger to the originating source indicating that a valid email address has been found thus subjecting you to even more spam down the road. Even using the preview pane in email products sends web beacons back to spammers if you have HTML enabled.

(http://helpdesk.gwu.edu/mailfilter/spam.html)

Here are a few steps you can take to try and avoid spam.

1. Don’t open unsolicited Spam. Often what happens is that when you open up spam, it sends back a trigger to the originating source indicating that a valid email address has been found thus subjecting you to even more spam down the road.

2. Don’t use the Preview Pane for the same reasons as #1. Also adjust your email options not to automatically open up email messages. Set it so that after you finish reading one email and take the necessary action you return to the inbox and not open the next one.

3. Set you email options to accept mail from only people in your address book or safe lists.

4. Set some filters to automatically route spam to certain folders for easy deletion later.

5. Use a throwaway account for any online registrations you need such as news sites and contests, etc. Often these email addresses are sold to other places, particularly advertising firms. If the throwaway account gets over run, you can simply delete it and create another.

6. Use the BCC when composing emails and encourage your friends to do the same. What this does is protects mailing lists from email harvesters.

7. Never reply to any spam email that you happen to open and receive for the same reason as #1 above.